As they drive towards Lough Derg, Bobby interrogates Jenny as to her motivations for wishing to visit Lough Derg this year of all years. She responds that it is a particularly Irish form of religious devotion and expression.
"Many pilgrims surveying the crowds during the night vigil promise themselves that, on their following night of freedom, they will look down from their cubicle windows at the fascination of the scene, when the people emerge and group themselves in…
"The stone circles [of the Penitential Beds] are small. When this sanctuary was demolished in the seventeenth century the despoilers left only the rude foundation stones protruding from the soil..."
"The repetition of the baptismal vow [before St. Brigid's Cross] is a reaching back again towards baptismal innocence and is the usual ritual of retreats..."
